Cur­tains are drawn on a 15-year old case and a 7-day pub­lic cat­a­strophic spec­ta­cle played out on streets of Haryana, Pun­jab and Chandi­garh and on tele­vi­sion chan­nels across the coun­try with 20 years im­pris­on­ment of Pris­oner No. 1997 -Gurmeet Ram Rahim in a rape and sex­ual as­sault case.

Seal­ing the fate of the pseudo-saint and his vast Dera em­pire, the CBI spe­cial judge Jagdeep Singh, who con­victed Gurmeet Ram Rahim in a rape and sex­ual as­sault case on Au­gust 25, to­day at a Spe­cial Court set up in the Sonaria jail in Ro­htak sen­tenced him to 20 years rig­or­ous im­pris­on­ment af­ter de­tailed ar­gu­ments on the quan­tum of sen­tence.  He has been given the right to ap­peal to a higher court.  The ap­peal by the de­fense coun­sel to change the prison has also not been ac­cepted. 

Gurmeet Ram Rahim has been sen­tenced to 10 years im­pris­on­ment in each of the two cases of rape with Rs. 15 lakhs as fine in each of the cases. A com­pen­sa­tion of Rs. 14 lakhs each has been or­dered for each of the vic­tims.

It has been re­ported cour­tesy lawyers and jail staff that un­able to bear the bur­den of hear­ing the sen­tence of 20 years, the pseudo-saint broke down and had to be bod­ily lifted to be taken into the prison cell. 

As per or­ders of the Pun­jab and Haryana High Court, the Spe­cial court judge and his as­sis­tants were flown him in a state gov­ern­ment chop­per from Chandi­garh to Ro­htak and they landed on a spe­cially built he­li­pad next to the tem­po­rary jail premises.

On Au­gust 25, the Spe­cial Court at Panchkula con­victed the 50 year old Gurmeet Ram Rahim un­der Sec­tions 376 (rape) and 506 (crim­i­nal in­tim­i­da­tion) of the In­dian Pe­nal Code. 

“For a very long time to come, Gurmeet Ram Rahim will stay be­hind the four walls of the prison, even if he con­tin­u­ously com­plains of back pain. More than 8 more cases are pend­ing against him in­clud­ing the mur­der of Poora Sach ed­i­tor Ram Chan­dra Chat­tra­p­ati, Khatta Singh and Ran­jit Singh.” 

The CBI Spe­cial Pros­e­cu­tor Harinder Pal Singh Verma pressed for max­i­mum judge­ment whereas the lawyer for the guilty pseudo-saint S. K. Garg Nar­wana pleaded for le­niency on health grounds and the phil­an­thropic work done by Gurmeet Ram Rahim.  Ac­cord­ing to me­dia re­ports, the vic­tims have asked for max­i­mum sen­tence.  The pseudo-saint, call­ing him­self “Mes­sen­ger of God” has sought for­give­ness. 

Yes­ter­day, one of the spokesper­son of the Dera Sauda, Di­lawar In­saan, said, “It is an un­just ver­dict. We will ap­peal against it.” Putting up a bold front, he fur­ther said, “all good re­li­gious lead­ers have had to face such cir­cum­stances. We ap­peal to peo­ple to main­tain peace.” Sig­nif­i­cantly, the other two spokesper­sons of the Dera Sauda, the ubiq­ui­tous Dr. Aditya In­saan and Dhi­man In­saan have been booked un­der sedi­tion charges for in­sti­gat­ing the Dera fol­low­ers af­ter the pro­nun­ci­a­tion of the judge­ment on Au­gust 25. Both are ab­scond­ing till last re­ports. 

Af­ter re­ceiv­ing ad­verse pub­lic­ity, though the Haryana gov­ern­ment has nei­ther been dis­missed nor has the Chief Min­is­ter re­signed, the heavy se­cu­rity arrange­ments all over Ro­htak and Haryana have en­sured that the ag­i­tated Dera sup­port­ers ei­ther re­mained en­sconced in their homes or de­ras and no re­tal­ia­tory vi­o­lence was re­ported from any­where else. A few min­utes be­fore the judge­ment, a lady spokesper­son of the dera ap­pealed for calm and peace. 

For a very long time to come, Gurmeet Ram Rahim will stay be­hind the four walls of the prison, even if he con­tin­u­ously com­plains of back pain. Ac­cord­ing to in­for­ma­tion avail­able, there are more than 8 more cases pend­ing against him in­clud­ing the mur­der of Poora Sach ed­i­tor Ram Chan­dra Chat­tra­p­ati, Khatta Singh and Ran­jit Singh. An­shul Chat­tra­p­ati -the son of Ram Chan­dra Chat­tarpati has ap­pealed to all vic­tims to boldly come out and tell the truth the courts and the world.

“The be­gin­ning of the end of the Sauda Sirsa Dera has be­gun. There is no way that this dera can res­ur­rect it­self and ex­ert the kind of re­li­gious, po­lit­i­cal or spir­i­tual in­flu­ence which it used to have only a week back.”

The dera pseudo-saint in prison, the spokesper­sons ab­scond­ing and im­pli­cated for sedi­tion and ri­ot­ing, the com­plicit po­lit­i­cal lead­er­ship shell-shocked af­ter play­ing foot­sie all these years is now delet­ing tweets, dis­own­ing as­so­ci­a­tion with the Dera de­spite pho­to­graphic and video ev­i­dence, all prop­er­ties of the dera and Naam Char­cha Ghars of the dera in Haryana, Pun­jab and Ut­tar Pradesh have been sealed or are un­der scrutiny and the poor Dera fol­low­ers be­numbed to stay home, con­tem­plat­ing what went wrong, taken for a ride in many cases, may be seen in­dulging in small talk about who could be the next mes­siah.  Sadly and un­for­tu­nately, the Sikh re­li­gious and po­lit­i­cal lead­er­ship of all hues and shades is ashamedly ab­sent.

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The be­gin­ning of the end of the Sauda Sirsa Dera has be­gun. There is no way that this dera can ever res­ur­rect it­self and ex­ert the kind of re­li­gious, po­lit­i­cal or spir­i­tual in­flu­ence which it used to have only a week back.